a fun visit

mom, danielle & sadie came to visit us a couple weeks ago. it had been so long since we'd seen them--we were so glad they came!

it was a quick trip (mainly because chris, who had been out of town, came back sick. since danielle's family had been sick for the entire previous month, she wasn't taking any chances on getting sick again. i've never seen anyone pack up their stuff and load it in the car so fast in my life!)

anyhow, we had a fun time getting to be together for a couple days.

sadie & mckinlee doctoring animals and babies

sweet sadie

we spent some time at a beautiful outdoor shopping center.

danielle & sadie outside of francesca's

mom & i in our coordinating outfits (not planned!)

sadie & the pig

sadie belle & me watching the ducks

she got as close as she possibly could!

a cute one of sadie & nana

we stopped at the village burger bar for lunch--yum.

before they left the next day, i got mckinlee out of school early and we went for a gelato treat at paciugo's. sadie loved this big fountain.

everyone enjoying their gelato--it's the best!

miss sadie is getting so big

a quick visit--over too soon, but still lots of fun!

what i wore wednesday

well i haven't done a what i wore wednesday post in forever--thought i'd play along today.

linking up at the pleated poppy.

jeans: gap

shirt: jcp

shoes: target

necklace: michele busch

shirt: boutique called 201 collective

sweater: target

jeans: old navy

wedges: kohls

jewelry: michele busch and various other places for bracelets

(practicing with new lens--kind of blurry.)

shirt: old navy

jewelry: michele busch

tank & cardi: jcrew

shorts: old navy

jewelry: the vintage pearl, silpada

a cute one i never posted of mckinlee

skirt: target

boots: kohls

tank: justice

don't know where the rest came from

whole outfit: justice

converse: jcp

tank: jcrew

cardi: old navy

jeans: nordstrom

flips: target

cardi & ruffly tank: old navy

jeans: nordstrom

sandals: target

necklace: michele busch, bracelet: sam moon

shirt: old navy

scarf: target

jeans: nordstrom

boots: steve madden

(i can't figure out why blogger is highlighting this--please ignore)

date night

shirt: kohls

cardi: jcrew

belt: anthropologie

jeans: nordstrom

boots: steve madden

necklace: love stitched

thanks for stopping by!

a fun weekend

we hadn't done anything for our anniversary back in march (why we got married in march is beyond me. that is probably our busiest month every year!) anyway, we finally had a free weekend this past friday/saturday and planned a fun little outing.

here we are before we left friday afternoon

(it got a little chilly, so out came the boots!)

and what did we do, you may be wondering?

well--what says "let's-celebrate-18-years-of-love" better than...

a basketball game?

haha! no really, i was super excited!

we had been trying to decide something to do together--we've done the fancy dinner thing, the day spent shopping together thing, etc.

but i'd never been to a mavs game and was dying to go since i love basketball.

so off we went to the american airlines center to watch the mavs play the warriors!

here was our view for the evening:

we ate dinner first at the audi club which has an awesome buffet.

here was my second plate of food.

this was our view while we ate & listened to the pre-game show.

during half-time, we went to the coffee/dessert bar and split this caramel brownie. it was so rich we couldn't even finish it!

we had so much fun and they won!

watching a game live is SO much better than on tv. i love all the fun stuff they do during the timeouts and the energy of everyone around you is contagious! there was the cutest little boy the dance cam kept zooming in on--the audience just loved him.

(in case you're wondering... no, we did not make it on the dance cam. probably because chris wouldn't stand up and dance. ha!)

after the game, we stayed at a nice hotel downtown, but i forgot to take a picture.

the next morning we left the hotel and drove to a restaurant we love.

a chef in dallas who worked in a hotel or fancy restaurant? decided to open his own place and the coffee house cafe was born. it is so cute and the food is yummy.

here's chris with his mocha

and me with my latte

aren't they so pretty?

chris got the migas--i just love good presentation!

and i got the farm fresh breakfast. yum.

we ate, came back home and carried on with our busy day--meetings for him, grocery shopping for me.

but it was so nice to spend time just the two of us doing something fun and different!

welcome to the family, little mac

look who came to live with us...

poor little mac has been sitting in a box for some time while i was working on deleting a ton of old pictures and transferring others to a flash drive and snapfish. but i finally finished all that last night and now he is up and running and i am beyond excited! maybe now it won't take me an eternity to do a blog post while my computer gets locked multiple times!

we got a great deal on amazon for this baby. if there's anything i need to buy, i almost always go there first since most times shipping is free and you don't have to pay sales tax!

i'm open to any tips anyone can give me on macs.

here's my first question...can you print instagrams through iPhoto if you don't have photoshop?

randomness

here's a really random post for a monday morning.

1. i got my new camera lens and it's been a bit of a learning experience trying to use it. it's a 50mm fixed lens which means there is no zoom (your legs are the zoom!) and you need to shoot in manual mode (which i've been doing ever since i took that 'waste of 18 hours photography class'--but that's a post for another day.)
anyhow, i've been practicing with it whenever i can and got some good pictures of mck the other day. i love how she's in focus and everything else is blurred.

2. just an ordinary evening in our life...dishes about to be done, mck making a smoothie, chris feeding cosmo.

3. two little flowers left over from a bouquet chris brought home for me & mckinlee.

4. i found this recipe for strawberry spinach salad and now i am addicted to it. i altered a few things from the recipe--like reducing the sugar a lot and adding feta cheese, but left most everything else the same. it is SO good!

5. i got a coupon in the mail a couple weeks ago for a nail salon i had never been to before, so i went last thursday. i got a mani/pedi combo for $30! here are my bright toes and my new target flip flops that are already scuffed up!

6. mckinlee & i at the most important event of the year for us--the memorial of jesus' death.

(and a glimpse at my new blonde hair. also, mck is really not almost as tall as me--she had on some serious wedges! doesn't she look grown up though?)

7. a yummy pizza we made after our first bike ride of the year on saturday. our favorite toppings at the moment are fresh mushrooms, jalapenos, sun dried tomatoes & feta.

8. picture from last week of the bad weather. even though the sirens were going off, tornadoes were touching down all around us, mck's school was in lock down and i had my little area all ready to dive into under the stairs--we didn't get any damage. i still can't believe no one was killed--the destruction of some neighborhoods was just incredible. i will never forget turning on the news and seeing 18 wheelers just swirling through the air like little toy trucks!

very random, i told you.
i have been so busy that i haven't been taking many pictures at all or blogging.
also, i am so behind in project life--must work at getting that caught up.

have a good week!

a yummy recipe

chicken and cheese lasagna roll-ups

i got this recipe from genn at life in the hass house.
she is really into healthy eating and i just love reading all the things she's been making. she found this recipe on pinterest and posted it to her blog. i made it the other night and it was SO yummy! just thought i'd share in case you're looking for a new dish to add to your weekly rotation!

(i realize it would have been prettier and more healthy to have a nice green salad on the plate too, but oh well.)

the birds

did you ever see that old alfred hitchcock movie, the birds?
that movie completely.freaked.me.out.
i think that's when i developed an almost-phobia of birds. cannot stand birds in real life--despise them.
but give me a ceramic bird and i'm all there!

the other day i started wandering through my house taking a picture everytime i saw a bird. here are the results:

on the window sill in the laundry room

on a stack of books on my coffee table

in a little french dish on a side table

on another stack of books on a bookcase
(i also happen to love displays of 3 items and the number 3--very convenient since that applies to us. sadly, my favorite number is 5, but since it is highly unlikely that there will ever be 5 people in our family, i thought a bunch of 5's everywhere would look slightly odd!)

on a side table in our bedroom
a turquoise bird--does it get any better than that?

cute little canvas i picked up at target. this is hanging above chris' bedside table.
he hasn't said anything, but i'm sure he loves it. ha!

uh-oh. looks like i might have the beginnings of another little addiction.
have you ever seen a cuter owl?

i also love birds on jewelry. i'll save that post for another day.
you're welcome.